Friedland’s team then sets up a final meeting with the facility to discuss the results. “We explain where the building stands and the scoring process,” he says. “Then we follow up six months or one year later to see whether any corrective actions have been made.” Despite the follow-up, assessments in St. Clair County are voluntarily. Friedland’s team simply encourages facility managers to remediate the observations from the report into their operations. Because threats and vulnerabilities are ever-changing, the team also recommends assessments are completed annually.
IRVS Findings
Before using IRVS, Friedland’s team focused on completing security assessments on buildings and infrastructure in his jurisdiction. These assessments would take his team approximately 18 hours to complete. Now, with IRVS, his team can complete an all-hazards assessment in a fraction of the time. “IRVS shows you can make investments in security that would also have effects on wind damage or fire,” he says. “It presents a better picture to the owner by identifying areas affecting all hazards. An owner may have the most secure building there is, but it might be very susceptible to high-wind damage.”
Friedland’s team has found some interesting results among his jurisdiction’s buildings that have been screened using IRVS. For example, a communications facility achieved a good score for fire protection. However, upon further exploration, it was discovered adjoining facilities were not well protected against fire. “The facility we assessed took it upon themselves to train not only their employees in fire-extinguisher operations and fire safety, but they also invited everybody in the adjoining complex to the trainings,” Friedland recalls.
Most critical facilities have backup power these days, but Friedland is concerned about the lack of backup water—a vulnerability IRVS uncovers and for which Americans are frighteningly ill-prepared. “We feel strongly water is one of the areas that is overlooked in preparedness and planning,” Friedland notes. “We lose power but we never lose water, so when you say backup water everybody thinks they need bottles of drinking water in their back room. How many bottles of water do you have to pour into your HVAC to keep it running?”
He stresses if a municipality loses water for an extended period because of a tornado or explosion, there often are minimal—if any—water reserves. “Just about everything depends upon water and if you don’t have that continuous supply you’re going to shut down the economy,” Friedland adds. “Hospitals don’t have additional storage tanks. There are only so many trucks that can haul water. We are starting to explore our county to see where we stand in regard to water-resilience preparedness.”
Ultimately, IRVS is a starting point for a major shift in consciousness—one in which rather than waiting for an event and calling first responders for help after the fact, America’s building owners can be proactive in managing their own safety and resilience before devastating events transpire. “I think we need to shift the paradigm to focus more on preventing and mitigating before situations occur—building resilience into our buildings, so they can take the blow and keep functioning,” Friedland says. “We need to be able to take a hit and continue to operate.”
Online Buzz:
Read a blog by Dr. Mark Campbell, chief strategy and technology officer for Columbia, S.C.-based Unitrends, a provider of backup services for virtual and physical servers. Campbell writes about data and communications backup, as well as the components of a solid business continuity plan.